Are humans born good, sinful, neutral, divine, or something else?

Born pure, with an inborn knowledge of the Maker. No inherited sin — Adam repented and was forgiven, and no soul bears another's burden (Qur'an 6:164). Guilt begins only with your own choices.

Neither sinful nor divine: humans are evolved animals born with capacities for both cooperation and cruelty. Morality, on this view, grew out of the social instincts of a species that survives in groups.

None of the above by doctrine. Agnostics typically set aside 'original sin' as an unevidenced claim and read human nature through biology and psychology: born with capacities for both kindness and cruelty, shaped heavily by circumstance.

Both dignified and damaged: made in God's image (Genesis 1:27), yet born with a nature inclined toward sin — the doctrine of original sin, classically stated by Augustine. Orthodox Christians soften the formula: from Adam we inherit death and weakness, not personal guilt.

Born pure, with capacity for both: Judaism teaches no original sin, but two inclinations — a good impulse and a selfish one present from youth, which the midrash says can itself be harnessed to build homes and livelihoods. The morning prayer states, 'the soul You placed within me is pure.'

Neither sinful nor divine: beings arrive carrying karmic dispositions, wholesome and unwholesome, from past lives. One early text calls the mind «luminous» but stained by visiting defilements; the Mahayana develops this into buddha-nature — the capacity of every being to awaken.

Essentially divine: the self is either identical with Brahman or eternally God's own, and evil is a covering of ignorance, not a corrupted nature. Vivekananda turned this against the doctrine of original sin: calling humans sinners, he told his Chicago audience, is "a standing libel on human nature."

Neither fallen nor divine by right: every human is born with the divine light within, and human birth is a rare, precious chance to meet God — yet all fall under the sway of ego until the Guru turns them around.

It teaches no doctrine of human nature, but its institutions assume people are capable of both fairness and the abuse of power. Madison's remark that if men were angels no government would be necessary is the working assumption behind its checks and balances.

Neither sinful nor divine: humans are born with capacities for both good and harm, then shaped by nature, upbringing, and society. Original sin is explicitly rejected.

No dogma, but a working assumption: humans are capable of reason and self-rule, yet corruptible — above all by power. Madison put it plainly: if men were angels, no government would be necessary.

It teaches no doctrine of inborn goodness or sin. Its working claim is narrower: women and men are equal in dignity and capacity, and most of the differences in their lives are made by upbringing and institutions, not fixed at birth.

It takes no stand on good or sinful. Its distinctive claim, from Herder onward, is that humans are born into peoples — culture-bearing communities — and cannot flourish as rootless individuals.